Have we become, or are we becoming, a culture that devalues dialogue? And why should we care? In this episode, Dr. Wolfe explains how the 2016 election cycle became a critical pivot point for how we converse. From presidential rhetoric and political discourse to social media interaction and denominational decision-making, the developing trends of echo-chambering, superlatively, rage-baiting, and functional truth are shaping us as a culture (and as sub-cultures). But ancient wisdom calls. Wherever truth is merely functional and revolution is the highest virtue, counterclaims are disruptive to the desired culture-reforming movement, so honest dialogue is cast as immoral. That disruptive, disenchanted polemical style is wholly disinterested in dialogue. The undisciplined tongue is averse to the judicious ear. Those whose claims are laced in flippant superlatives, whose arguments are disrespectfully ad hominem, and whose end justifies their own means… they are not interested in “understanding, but only care to show off their own opinions” (Proverbs 18:2). They work for the death of dialogue in order to amplify the priorities of their positions. This is increasingly evident in every discipline today—political, religious, and otherwise. SOURCES: Browning, Kellen and Matt Zdun. “Online and on the Stump, Democrats Embrace a Four-Letter Word.” The New York Times, April 9, 2026 (https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/09/us/politics/democrats-social-media-profanity-f-word.html).McGurn, William. “The Profane President Trump,” Wall Street Journal, March 23, 2028 (https://www.wsj.com/opinion/the-profane-president-trump-178f4333).Stone, Roger. *The Making of the President 2016*. New York: Skyhorse, 2017.Taylor, Charles. *A Secular Age*. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007.Truman, Carl. *To Change All Worlds: Critical Theory from Marx to Marcuse*. Brentwood, TN: B&H Academic, 2024. Vance, JD. *Communion: Finding My Way Back to Faith*. New York: Harper, 2026.Watkins, Zoe. "Rage-Baiting and the Christian response." Baptist and Reflector, February 9, 2026 (https://baptistandreflector.org/rage-baiting-and-the-christian-response/).Wootson. Cleve R. Jr., Clara Ence Morse, Lydia Sidhom, and Eric Lau. “Profanity is a hallmark of Trump’s second term, a Post analysis finds.” The Washington Post, May 21, 2026 (https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2026/05/21/profanity-is-hallmark-trumps-more-combative-second-term/).
